The problem

People with chronic knee or back pain don’t get the care they need. This impacts their quality of life and is a number one driver of costs for health care providers and productivity loss for employers.

I designed the service, software and hardware to deliver the key elements of best practice care for chronic knee and back pain, all to be delivered in the comfort of a person’s own home.

Donna describes her experience going through the 12-week program for chronic knee pain.

Prototyping and validation

Throughout the development, I engaged with target users and health experts alike; first to come up with the core proposition, and later to validate the solution. While it was relatively clear what users needed to do to get better, keeping them engaged in those activities was key. I mapped out opportunities to enforce positive behaviour patterns, and designed targeted interventions to enable them. As soon as the basics of the technology were ready it was deployed to cohorts of test users who provided a continuous stream of feedback.

From initial research and throughout ongoing development, involving users in the process was the highest priority

A map of factors that drive behaviour change served as a guide for targeted experiments

IoT devices fit for the job

To enable the digitisation of physiotherapy, I designed a set of versatile motion sensors in an iterative process supported by live alpha and beta testing. Once the design was set, I set up the production and supply chain, working with producers across the UK, EU and Asia.

Early design sketch of the sensor bands

3D-printing and off-the-shelf electronics components helped to rapidly create many iterations of prototypes

A preview of the final design that went into production

Digital care

The service was designed based on three key aspects: Physiotherapy, education and behaviour change. The main challenge was to break the complexity of care down and package it in a digital solution that users with any level of understanding of technology could benefit from.

The win-win-win

From the start, success had to be measurable for users, payers and my client. Here are just a few of the successes of this project.

Bonus: Advocating human centred design

Leading all aspects of design, I worked proactively on creating a culture of design thinking within the organisation, organising workshops, book clubs, visits from field experts and - most importantly - including every employee in the design process.

Not a startup?

See how I helped British Airways to develop first-in-industry services for their mobile app.